The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1887-08-19

their hands, reckless OF the blopd
streaming out from broken finger nails
and heaping it up In little mounds
while all the while came the heartreud-
ing cry, 'for Gods sake don't let us
burn TO DEATH" But finally the vic
tory was won, the fire was put out af-
ter four hours Of endeavor, and as its
last sparks died away, light came up
in the east to take their place, and
dawn came upon scene of horror.
OVER ONE HUNDRED DEAD.
While the fight had been going on
men had been dying, and there were
not SO many wounded to take out of
the wreck as there had been four hours
before. But in the meantime the
country had been aroused, help had
come from Chatsworth, Forest and
Piper City, and as the dead were laid
reverently alonside of each other out
in the corn-feld, there were ready
hands to take them into Chatsworth,
while some of the wounded were car
ried to Piper City. One hundred and
eighteen was the awful poll of the
dead, while the wounded number four
time that many. The full tale of the
dead cannot, however, be told yet for
days.
SCENE OF HORROR.
The Town Hall was the main hospi-
tai and in it anxious relatives and sor
rowing friends sat and famed gently
the sufferers faces, queried the attend
ing surgeons as they bound up the
wounds and insisted that there must be
hope. Down in the dead houses, faith
ers, husbands, brothers, sisters, wives
and children tearfully inspected each
face as it was uncovered and sighed as
the features were unknown or cried out
in anguish when the well-known face
sometimes fearfully mangled, but rec
ognizable, was uncovered. The entire
capacity of the little village was taxed
and kind-hearted women drove in
from miles to give their gentle minis
trations to the sufferers.
No sooner had the wreck occurred
than a scene of robbery commenced
Some band of recreants, heartless and
with only animal instincts, was on
hand, and like the guerrillas who
throng battle field the night after the
conflict and filch from the dead the
money which they received for their
meagre pay, stealing even the bronze
medals and robbing from the children
of heroes the other worthless emblems
of their fathers bravery, so last night
did these human hyenas plunder the
dead from this terrible accident and
take even the shoes which covered
their feet. Who these wretches are is
not now known. Whether they were
a band of pickpockets who accompan-
led the train, or members of some
robber gang who we're lurking in the
vicinity, cannot be said.
WAS THE TRAIN WRECKED BY THIEVES.
The horrible suspicion, however, ex-
lists, and there are many who give it
credit, that the accident was deliber
ately planned case of train wrecking /;
that the bridge was set on fire by mis-
cfeants who hoped to seize the oppor-
tunity offered, and the fact that the
bridge was 81 far consumed at the time
the train came along, and the added
fact that the train was an hour and
a half late are pointed out as evidence
of a careful conspiracy. 1t seems
hardly possible that man could be 80
lost to all the ordinary feeling which
apimates the basest of the human race
but still, men who will rob dead men,
who will steal from the dying and will
plunder the wounded, held down by
broken beams of a wrecked car, whose
death by FIRE seemed imminent, can do
most anything which is base, and that
is what these fiends in human form
did. They went into the cars when
the fire was burning fiercely underneath
and, when the poor wretches who were
pinned there begged them "For Gods
sake to help them out" stripped them
of their watches and jewely and search
ed their pockets for money. When the
dead bodies were laid out in the corn.
fields these hyenas turned them over
in their search for valuables, and that
the plundering was done by an organ
lied gang was proven by the fact tha,
J this morning out in the corn field six
teen purses, all empty, were found in
, one heap. 1t was ghastly plundering
and had the plunderers been caught
they would surely have been lynched